How will county celebrate this decision?

Monday

Sep 23, 2013 at 4:17 AMSep 23, 2013 at 4:19 AM

North Carolina's elected officials made the national news again this week but not for their usual civil rights violation stunts. National Banned Book Week is usually a time when readers and literary supporters share in the responsibility of maintaining the freedom to seek and to express ideas in literature even when they are considered unorthodox. The Randolph County School Board may have been confused by the oxymoronic title of the observance when they voted 5-2 to ban Ralph Ellison's undisputed autobiographical masterpiece, "Invisible Man," from school libraries.

North Carolina’s elected officials made the national news again this week but not for their usual civil rights violation stunts. National Banned Book Week is usually a time when readers and literary supporters share in the responsibility of maintaining the freedom to seek and to express ideas in literature even when they are considered unorthodox. The Randolph County School Board may have been confused by the oxymoronic title of the observance when they voted 5-2 to ban Ralph Ellison’s undisputed autobiographical masterpiece, “Invisible Man,” from school libraries.

I wonder how the county will celebrate over this latest anti-intellectual victory? Maybe creating a “Book Burning Pit” where students toss required reading texts in to flames while parents circle the fire chanting about the preservation of innocence. Oh, but that sounds a bit too Harry Potter/Hunger Games/Where The Wild Things Are satanic doesn’t it? Maybe they could include a banning book component to their county fair? But they risk fair-goers getting all Alice in Wonderland/The Wonderful Wizard of Oz/ Charlotte’s Web freaky. No they will likely sponsor a “Drown the Underpaid English Teacher” dunking booth on campus and just hope that it doesn’t cause any Animal Farm/Grapes of Wrath/Uncle Tom’s Cabin political hysteria. They could host a celebratory town dance as long as it doesn’t become a sexually explicit Lady Chatterley’s Lover/Madame Bovary/Anne Frank rave. But, knowing their chaste, they will likely turn to religious texts for comfort, which is fine as long as it’s not The New Testament/Koran/Torah.

Naturally ours is not the only government led by leaders that value mass ignorance, it is practically Avant-garde with dictators.

North Carolina’s reputation for literary achievement lost some its glory this week. But just how far elected officials will go to culturally devastate our state will be left to those that vote without using their brains

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